On May 15 and 16, 1917, the Serbs entered Bosilegrad through the paramilitary formation of Kosta Pečanac. This gang moved in Bosilegradsko for only 2 days, but as a result of its abuses, 32 people were killed, 2 children were burned alive, and the property of 317 households was destroyed. This is how the historian Angel Johnev describes the Bosilegrad massacre in his book dedicated to the massacre at the end of the First World War.
The history of the Western outskirts is a series of war crimes against the legitimate aspiration of the Bulgarians for the failed national unification. With this aim, Bulgaria joined the geopolitical conflict during the First World War on the side of the Central Powers. Together with the allies, the Bulgarian army begins a military offensive against Serbia. In less than two months, the Serbian kingdom ceased to exist. The rest of the Serbian army escaped through Albania. In the controlled areas, the Central Union introduces its administration. Bulgaria creates the Macedonian and Moravian military-inspection area with established district, district and municipal structures.
In 1916, the war continued on the southern front on the border with Greece, and on the northern front in Romania. Northern Dobrudja and Southeastern Macedonia were recaptured, but the region of Bitola was ceded. The pressure of the agreement forces in this section is combined with sabotage and sabotage actions in Pomerania. This task was assigned to the Serbian lieutenant Kosta Milovanovic Pechanac, who at the end of September 1916 was transported by plane to Pomerania with instructions to organize the so-called Toplishka rebellion against the Bulgarian authorities, to weaken the rear of the Bulgarian command and to coordinate it with the attempted breakthroughs on the Southern Front.
The action itself begins with an attack on the railway. Niš-Skopje line at Ristovac station and the killing of wounded Bulgarian and German soldiers in a sanitary compound. On May 15-16, 1917, Kosta Pechanats with a detachment of 200-250 Chetniks invaded the territory of the Kingdom of Bulgaria in the area of Bosilegradsko and for two days looted the peaceful Bulgarian population. In the villages of Gorna and Dolna Lyubata, Bosilegrad, Dolna and Gorna Lisina, Topli dol, Dolna and Gorna and Razhana, 32 civilians were killed in a particularly cruel way in their homes, mainly adults, women and children, among them two village teachers. two children, names unknown, were burned in a burning house, 317 houses and other buildings were burned. Livestock, valuables and foodstuffs were looted. The damage caused is worth BGN 2.5 million.
A larger part of the population was warned at the last moment and managed to escape. Nowhere on their way did the Serbian bandits encounter Bulgarian military units and this allowed them to abuse, kill, burn and rape with impunity. In some mountain villages, self-organized local villagers put up armed resistance to ensure the escape of their women and children before the pogrom. In the first clash with a combined company from Kyustendil, Pechanats crossed the Serbian-Bulgarian border and retreated to Kosovo.
The invasion of Bulgarian territory and the massacre in Bosilegradsko 100 years ago is another step in the centuries-old Serbian aspirations to conquer Bulgarian lands and assimilate, i.e. serbization of the Bulgarian population. Taking advantage of the moment when there are no Bulgarian military units in Bosilegradsko, and all military-capable men are mobilized to the front, Kosta Pechanats, on the instructions of the Serbian command, conducts a cruel terrorist attack against the peaceful Bulgarian population with the aim of violence and robbery in violation of all known conventions and rules for conducting military operations.
This is the third Serbian military action to control Bosilegrad, which took place at the beginning of the last century in 1913, 1915 and 1917 and ended with the peace treaty of Nyojska and the occupation of the western outskirts by the State of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes.< /p>
One of the goals of this terrorist attack was to produce a strong psychological effect on the Headquarters, which was then located in Kyustendil. That is why this action was assigned to a hardened terrorist and murderer like Kosta Pechanats, who has experience in carrying out such terrorist actions not only against the Bulgarian population in Macedonia, but also against the population in Pomerania with the aim of violence and robbery.
The memories of this horror still live in Bosilegradsko.